Then the dam gave, releasing the pent-up flood. The cum did not come in spurts as was normal with ejaculation. The spasms of his cock were so close together as to become almost one continuous spray. He dumped more cum in Garalach than he thought possible, more than he had ever come before. Anal sex was his preferred method, and this was a Lorin he was fucking, a real person with real elemental emotions.
Melenius tweaked Garalach’s hairless, pink nipples while his cock still twitched, and it was only then that he saw Garalach’s own cum all over his belly. Melenius had jacked him off to completion, and they both had finished at the same time. He slowly pulled himself out of Garalach’s tight ass and rolled off his friend.
“Bathe us,” Melenius commanded the nearest slave.
“At once, Dominus.” Towels, sponges, and basins of warm, scented water were fetched.
While the slaves washed them, Garalach kissed Melenius’s shoulder. “That was the best I’ve ever had it.”
Melenius heard this kind of praise often, but all he could think of at that moment was Nevia. He wished it were her ass he had just abused. He wished it were her back passage where he had released his hot seed. He missed the way she felt wrapped around him. He missed the way she fought and her saucy attitude, the very thing that now seemed to be keeping them apart.
Chapter Nine
Nevia did not speak at once, instead taking stock of her body. Had she already been fucked by this human, with his elementally emotionless face and shaved cock? All her airs shivered in her relief at realizing she was still untouched.
“It is good to see you awake. I have waited the better part of the day for you.” Belamal slid up beside her and began to caress her bare breast. “Your father told me that you were so concerned about your deflowering that you had accidentally taken too much poppy wine.” He leaned forward and kissed her ear. “He told me that I ought simply to take you while you slept, but I did not wish to do so.”
Nevia understood at once. Once Belamal had had her, Judal doubtless thought that Melenius would want her no more. She was only half listening as Belamal spoke. She considered her options. She could let Belamal take his pleasure from her body, but why should she? He was not her husband; he had no rights to her flesh. In fact, to give him anything of herself would be to take from Melenius. It was to Melenius that she had given herself, and she would not be given by her father to any man.
“I will take the chill from your flesh with my warmth, and I will draw the fair statue that is Nevia Akara Belamal to me and make the maid of Nirrion into the mother of the republic.”
Nevia’s fires burned through her airs in her disgusted irritation. Did Belamal really think that this would woo her? But to kill him outright would mean being set upon by every guard in the house. She would not survive the run to Melenius’s home. She must do something else. “Belamal.” She pushed his hand from her breast. “I know that in your heart I am second to the republic—”
“I have spoken to you of that before.” Belamal’s eyes were wide and bright, and there was blood in his cheeks. “I do love you, wife.”
“I do not fault you.” Nevia could have laughed at how little Belamal’s ranking of her and the republic mattered. “On the contrary, it is admirable.”
Belamal’s hands strayed back to her breasts, and Nevia once more pushed them away.
“Belamal, what would you give to be the savior of Nirrion?”
He stopped in his attempted caresses. “I would give my life, my heart’s blood.”
“Would you give up me?” Nevia pulled the coverlets up to hide her breasts. She recalled Melenius’s praise of them, and she did not want to make Belamal’s decision more difficult. “If you forgo the pleasures of my body, I can offer to you my fires.” This was, of course, a lie. Nevia could give to Belamal the gift she was offering perfectly well whether he fucked her or not, but she knew that he could have no way of knowing that.
“What do you mean?” Belamal stared at her with the same look she had seen at the betrothal feast, that look of worship. “What can your fires do for Nirrion?”
“Nothing so long as I keep them to myself,” said Nevia. “But I can inflame you with them. You are already a general, a warrior with great ability. My brother has spoken of your talents on the battlefield, of your tactical skill. You held Vieta far longer than anyone could have expected.” She watched Belamal’s face as she spoke. The blood in his cheeks grew a brighter red.
“The situation is far graver than any here in the city are aware. Vieta has not only fallen, it has been cursed. Nothing will grow there; the land is barren. It is to this most of all that we owe our loss. It was only your Lorin friend, Firin, who took my words seriously. He tried to give me more troops, but no one would listen to his speeches.”
Nevia burned. She knew quite well that no one would listen to Melenius because he was both too proudly Faror and a Lorin. His passions, his beliefs, were invisible to any but her. At that instant, she longed for him as intensely as if he had just been stripped from her. “He is a wise man.”
“Yes, but I rather think I could have done without his support. Perhaps then someone else might have listened.”
Nevia resolved at that moment that, if her attempts to charm Belamal failed, she would burn him alive and take her chances. “What is the true state of Nirrion, then?”
“The Kindor barbarians took Vieta. They have a foothold in Nirrion proper, and their supply lines are well established. Spring is passing into summer, and the war will all too soon be at the gates of our city.”
“Then you should listen to my offer.” Nevia wrapped the coverlet more securely around her. “As I said, if you forgo my body, then I can share with you my fires. You are already a skilled commander, a seasoned general. I can inflame that; I can make you a genius, a military commander the likes of which has not been seen since Skenjus himself founded our republic. Would that suffice you to overcome the Kindor savages?”
“Yes.” Belamal slid from the bed and knelt before Nevia. “It is not that they are more skillful than we, or braver even – it is that they outnumber us. An advantage of numbers alone I could overcome if I were only able to take full advantage of our superior weaponry.”
“I can give you that, but you will not be able to have me.” Nevia rose and stood, wrapped in the coverlet, before the naked man who claimed to be her husband. “It would be too much. Even still, it may be too much. If I set you alight with my fires, then you will not be able to quench them. They will burn until there is nothing left of you.”
“But I will be able to save Nirrion?” Belamal’s hands were clasped before him, and he looked up at Nevia with eyes both wide and damp.
“Yes.” Nevia began to call up her fires. “I will give you this, if you swear that this power, and not I, is what you want.”
“I swear. Make me Nirrion’s savior.”
Nevia had never done anything quite like this before, but she knew that her elemental mastery, particularly of Fire, her primary element, was greater even than Garalach’s. She sent her fires coursing through her arm and into her hand. She sent them flowing down into Belamal, a blaze not of flame but of inspiration. Everything in Belamal that was active and brilliant and powerful grew stronger. Her Earth tinged her Fires, of course, and everything that was regenerative or generative in Belamal burst forth.
“Great goddess Nevia!”
Nevia realized that it was she whom he considered his goddess.
“I should have chosen you, not Nirrion!” Belamal grasped her by the arms and pressed his mouth to hers. Steam rose up where his burning lips touched her frosty ones.
“No, Belamal.” Nevia refused to name him “husband”, nor would she use his personal name either. Such intimacies were only for Melenius. “You swore to me, and if it is Nirrion that you would save, you must use your energies for her. Besides, it is not true desire; it is only the effect of my fires in your flesh.” She wrenched her arms from his grasp.
Belamal gro
aned and gestured to his suddenly-erect cock. “But I must fuck something.”
“Surely you have a pleasure slave?” Nevia settled back onto the bed.
“Yes.” Belamal opened the door and called out down the hallway. “Bring me a pleasure slave! No, bring me two!”
Nevia went to the nearest chest and pulled out the first gown she found. As she slipped it over her head, she heard the entrance of the two pleasure slaves.
“Bend over!” Belamal began to fuck one immediately, not even giving her a chance to kneel.
Nevia, clothed now, avoided the bed and went to a long, low divan. She stretched herself out on it. “Brush my hair before the Dominus requires you.”
“Yes, Domina.” The waiting pleasure slave obeyed, but Nevia noticed that the girl’s eyes were fixed on Belamal with an expression Nevia only wished she could identify. Why could not humans simply have elements? Emotions ought to be expressed clearly, in the motions of the fire and air, in the tremors of the earth and whirling of the water. Instead, the tiny movements of the mouth and eyes were expected to convey everything.
The girl whom Belamal was penetrating moaned aloud.
“I have it!” Belamal’s attention did not seem to Nevia to be on the girl. “There is a valley just north of Vieta. That is where the city’s river originates. So far the water is not poisoned. We can begin there.”
Nevia did not pay further attention to his words. Military tactics did not interest her. Instead she noted how he threw the girl to the floor and grabbed the next, ramming his cock into her until she screamed, but still he did not seem to see the girl.
“I must go to the Senate.” Belamal dropped the second girl in her turn. His cock was still erect; he had not come.
“The Senate will not meet in the middle of the night.” Nevia gestured to the girls to leave.
“But we must leave tomorrow.” Belamal paced back and forth across the floor. “I will have the soldiers mustered then. I will rouse them out of the whorehouses where they are lying. You!” He whirled on Nevia.
“Yes?”
“You have done this – this glorious thing to me. You can heal the barrenness of the land in Vieta!”
“Yes.” Nevia knew that this was likely possible. “But I cannot do it alone, not if all the farmland of Vieta is affected. I will need the aid of Senator Firin.”
“You shall have it. You shall have everything you desire.” Belamal knelt before her and kissed her hands, then rose to his feet. “The Senate must meet with the dawn, and I will tell them of my plans. By tomorrow afternoon, we shall be on our way to Vieta.”
“Our way?” Nevia hoped only that Melenius would be near her in the procession. She did not hope to be able to escape with him so long as Belamal was present. Her flames shining in his face gave even Nevia pause. He might be able to detect her love for Melenius, and then Melenius would be torn apart by Belamal’s soldiers.
“Yes, you are to accompany me as far as Vieta. You will be able to heal the land there once I have retaken it. Then I will press the Kindor back south and still farther south until I level their city.”
“Good.” Nevia rose. “I will have my things ready to depart by the time the Senate session ends.”
“And I will go now to rouse my men.” As Belamal swept past her, still naked and still erect, Nevia knew that if his men had been devoted to him before this, now they would worship him.
She smiled in her airs and followed Belamal as far as the atrium. She stared up at the night sky, and the caress of the night wind was on her cheek. Longing surged in her. She was one step closer to Melenius, but only one.
Chapter Ten
Melenius stumbled in late, shouldering his way past Senate floor guards while tugging at his toga, putting the final adjustments to it. He had run almost the whole way from the Nerivi to the Forum, his bodyguards barely able to keep up with him. The servants of the Senate made way for the Lozabet senator, bowing to him as he passed. Melenius’s head pounded from the hangover that had laid him out on his bed – that and the whirlwind sex he and Garalach had enjoyed all night. The dawn had come with them lying in each other’s arms, chatting and kissing, their tongues heavy with wine. Though Garalach had been his partner that night, it was Nevia Melenius wanted. Though he fiddled with Garalach’s waterfall locks, it was Nevia’s white-blonde hair that captured his imagination. Garalach was a fine lover, one of the best ass-fuckings Melenius had ever given, but he was no substitute for Nevia. Melenius could not put his finger on it, but it most likely had something to do with their elements. Garalach was Water and Earth, sharing Water with Melenius and Earth with Nevia. Nevia, however, was Fire and Earth, both elements Melenius lacked and therefore craved. It was as if Nevia had been made for Melenius, and vice versa.
All this blew through Melenius’s busy mind as he walked down the dark stone hallway, approaching the Senate floor. The seats were full of senators, and the majority of their countenances bore looks of confusion. Some politicians cheered, others booed, and still others were silent, keeping their peace as they always did. A normal day at work.
Belamal was the source of their equal parts derision and adulation. He stood at the center of the round Senate floor looking up at the assembled senators. He wore his full dress battle armor, a breastplate of gilded steel bearing the engraving of the Sentinel, the mighty volcano which symbolized Nirrion’s strength. In his right hand he held his high-crested helmet while his left hand gestured to the crowd. His long, crimson cloak fell behind him and swept the floor as he moved, and he spoke with more animation than Melenius had ever seen in him before.
As Melenius climbed the stairs to his seat, he saw it: Nevia’s fires leaped from Belamal, shrouding him in her glory, lighting his eyes, and illuminating his soul. He had had Nevia. Her elements were all over him. Melenius knew he was the only one in the room who could see it. Garalach would have been able to as well, had he been there, but when the reports came to the house about the mustering of Belamal’s troops, Garalach had fled with as much speed as if he were a soldier eager for war.
Belamal exhorted the Senate to follow him into a bold new offensive. He glowed with Nevia’s fires inside and out, and Melenius felt ill. He knew that every word of Belamal’s would be etched into the minds of the listeners. The senators were, after all, mere men, unable to resist such persuasion.
“I have already spoken of my battle plans, noble fathers of our republic,” Belamal cried out. “When I was obliged to surrender Vieta to the enemy, I saw the Kindor hard at work, and their black-cloaked priests scattered across the land. They work in the service of the Master-Smith.”
Veirakai, Melenius thought. What was it with people’s superstitions about the dark god’s name?
Belamal laid his helmet aside and stretched out both his arms. “Just as a boy might swat a fly, with equal ease the Kindor poisoned the rich, fertile farmlands around Vieta, doubtless to make the fields unfit for agriculture. They mean to exterminate us.”
Senator Enad stood and raised his hand to speak. “We have heard your bedtime stories about the savagery of the Kindor before. There is no proof that they are different from any other foe.” The high-ranking, influential senator turned to his colleagues. “Who indeed can stand against the might of our holy republic?” And then to Belamal he said, “Your fear-mongering—”
“Sit down,” Belamal commanded, and Enad’s mouth snapped shut. “You shall not speak again!”
Gasps rippled through the assembly. Melenius watched with a curious eye. Though Nevia’s fires were proof that Belamal had been intimate with his Nevia, Melenius could not help but feel pride for how completely her elements infused this man who, in his estimation, was her mouthpiece.
“The life of Vieta is gone,” Belamal said. “The earth itself is without virtue. Nothing will grow there again.”
Judal the Younger, Nevia’s older brother, stood and spoke, and though he was a senator, he was not dressed in the traditional white toga. Instead, he wore his b
lood-red Alaxton battle armor. “Why would they do this?”
Melenius’s mind raced. Judal the Younger was back in the city. Why? Had he not been dispatched to the front lines near Vieta? Melenius remembered Nevia saying something about her priest brother being needed where the battle was most fierce.
“Nevius,” Belamal answered, being uncommonly familiar with the Akar heir in open session, “you have seen their depredations firsthand.” The general turned his attention to the rest of the chamber. “They did this for the sake of an ancient hate. It is not conquest they seek; it is destruction. They do not want our lands; they want to annihilate us. And so we must obliterate them first. I shall destroy them to the last man.”
The Basur consul stirred in his high-backed, ornate chair. “Ancient hate?”
“Yes, I learned it of their captains before I slew them. Centuries ago, before Nirrion herself came to be, there dwelt in this land two tribes of people. One was of our own stock, and their leader was the man whose name we all share: Skenjus. The other leader was called Kindor, and he led his own tribe. Skenjus and Kindor were allied then.”
Gasps of shock and displeasure rippled through the Senate, but no one interrupted the general, who went on as though he had not heard. “They planned to construct a mighty city, and they chose a place, here.” Belamal gestured to the floor beneath his feet. “Here, where Nirrion now stands. They planned out their city, where its walls would be, where its gates, where its bridges. But Skenjus and Kindor could not agree about one thing, one vital thing. They could not agree about which god to whom to dedicate their city. Skenjus said that, if their city was to be the glory of the world – as why build a city otherwise? – then it ought to be dedicated to the King of all the gods, to the Just One, to Jehiel, the Great Father himself.”
Murmurs of appreciation now filled the hall, but Belamal seemed unmoved by the approbation. “But Kindor disagreed. Kindor wished to dedicate the city to the Builder, to the one who responds the most quickly when he is appeased with sacrifice, to the Master-Smith, to Veirakai himself.”
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